No Happy Endings
by mockingjayde
Summary: One-shot. One of my wild theories about what COULD have happened at the end of Mockingjay  but didn't, luckily!  What happens if there's no happy endings?


**Disclaimer:** I am not Suzanne Collins. All rights go to her.

***UPDATED***

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BAM! My world fills with black as I am thrown backwards. Screams penetrate the air, and the scent of explosives and smoke fill my nostrils. I land onto something hard and sharp. I can feel the warm blood trickle down my skull.

My thoughts instantly take me back in time. Each new memory brings more throbbing to my already pounding head.

"Remember, stealing's punishable by death." Katniss said in a small voice. She looks up at me, her features so young… so helpless. Her gray eyes, wide with excitement and curiosity. My Catnip.

Her lips. Her soft lips against mine. "I had to do that. Just once."

Posy and Vick, tugging on my Mother's skirt. "Mommy, when's daddy coming home?"

The memories pool up behind my eyelids. I've heard stories on how people's lives flash before their eyes as they're dying. Is this what's happening to me? Am I dying?

"PEETA!" a voice screams, shattering the stream of my memories. It's Katniss. I await my name to be called but it never does.

She called his name. Not mine.

I will myself to open my eyes. Splotches of random colors dance across my vision. Smoke is everywhere. Small fires are lit here and there, and there's no sign of President Snow.

The smoke clears up a little bit but patches of bright green and yellow disrupt my vision. I can just barely make out a darkened figure through the ashy debris.

"Katniss?" my voice is hardly audible. "Katniss?"

My head and my heart are pounding but I have to get to her. It takes several tries to get my legs working again and by now I've lost so much blood that I feel dizzy. With difficulty, I approach Katniss only to see her kneeling down next to some burnt, mutilated object on the ground.

It's Peeta Mellark.

"Catnip?" I whisper. My anger towards her instantly vanishes after seeing her in this desperate state. My head aches to much to even be worth getting angry. She doesn't look back. I wonder, can she hear me? The smoke sifts a bit and I can see. She has one of Mellark's hands in hers.

"I'm sorry," she says quietly, her voice is close to tears. I'm not sure if she's talking to me or Mellark. I put my hand on her shoulder. She doesn't notice. She's ignoring me. Or just not caring. Her attention is undivided fully for Mellark.

Isn't that how it's always been though? It's always been about Peeta. Ever since after the first Hunger Games. It's useless to think about what could have been. What could have been before the Hunger Games. Before I was her 'cousin'. Before Peeta Mellark took everything away from me. I'm reminded of how much I actually loathe him. I hate him for taking Katniss like this, and I hate myself for not doing enough about it.

Quietly, a small sound squeaks out of his remains. "Kat…niss?"

"Peeta?" she squeezes his hand harder. "Peeta!"

Mellark says something back, but I'm not able to catch it. My grip on Katniss's shoulder is all I have left to hang on to as the world spins around me.

Katniss sniffles. She brushes the singed hair out from his face.

Deep in the meadow, under the willow. A bed of grass, a soft green pillow. Lay down your head, and close your sleepy eyes. And when again they open, the sun will rise

She's singing. I recognize the song. It's the same one she sang to that little girl in the 74th Hunger Games. Her voice cracks and falls and it's like she's whispering the words rather than singing them.

Here it's safe, here it's warm. Here the daisies guard you from every harm. Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true. Here is the place where I love you. Deep in the meadow, hidden far away. A cloak of leaves, a moonbeam ray. Forget your woes and let your troubles lay. And when again it's morning, they'll wash away.

Here it's safe, here it's warm. Here the daisies guard you from every harm Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true. Here is the place where I love you.

Where I love you.

My legs finally drop to the floor behind her. Hadn't I'd known this all along? I'd been a fool to deny it for so long. She loves Mellark. Katniss loves Mellark. She doesn't love me. I don't know if she ever has.

"Peeta," she whispers with a shaky voice. "Peeta?"

There's a trace of a smile on Mellark's ash-ridden face. "love…you, Katniss." he gets out. I watch as he goes limp.

Katniss begins to sob, and I'm surprised to feel tears on my face too. Not because the death of Peeta, not because of Katniss's pain, not for any reason at all. There is no future for me. No nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Knives stab my head, my heart. The pounding coming from the firey object in my chest throbs out of control. Nausea rushes though me. I can feel myself slipping…

"Catnip," I mutter quietly. My last words. The goodbyes are still on my lips but I can't say them. My world floats in and out of focus and I have no choice but to leave her completely alone in the remains of the Capitol.

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**A/N**: Er, okay. Not my best. Sorry for any ooc. I originally intended someone to be left living in the end with Katniss, but then I was thinking… sometimes there is no happy endings! MUAHAHAH. Anyways, sorry for killing both Peeta and Gale. Don't hate me, please. Heh. ConCrit would be good on this piece, because I admit I did have a hard time writing it. Anyhoo, thanks for reading! :3


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